A life lived in the feminine. Hear my tales.

Month: February 2016

You’re single, you’re a mom, you have a job—and you want to date. Me too. So before you tell me it’s impossible, I offer you this: Anything is possible! I know, I know, the logistics of dating as a solo parent who’s working to provide for her family can get tough. I’m right there in the trenches online and on apps, looking for love and, mostly, looking to stay out of trouble. Sometimes it seems I’m swimming in a very shallow dating pool, but I haven’t given up and taken in fifty cats. Yet.

So here’s the “downlow” on dating sites I’ve tried as a SWM (single working mother). You should try too. And remember: You can do it at home, at night after the kids go to bed, in your jammies if you want.

Phone Apps

TinderPros: Tinder is quick and easy. You set it up through your Facebook account and set your preferences within minutes. You won’t waste time filling out large forms and questionnaires, and your pictures are right there on Facebook. (Caveat: Don’t use photos of you with your kids or of them alone, for their safety. You never know.) Searching for matches is super simple. Once you’ve set age and distance preferences, you start swiping. A simple swipe left and dreamguy is gone forever; a simple swipe right, and he could end up a match for life!

If you have to wonder if someone loves you, chances are he or she doesn’t.
But there are a few things that someone who truly loves you for all of who you are will NEVER do, no matter what.

If the person does these things, chances are he or she is toxic and it’s not a healthy love.

A person who loves you will never:

1- Leave For Good:

He or she may temporarily leave your life or need a break, but if the person really loves you, he or she isn’t going to leave you for life. Eventually, that person will return to you. The old adage, “if you love someone set them free, if they return…”is true. True love returns. Passing fancy does not.

It’s normal to need a break and it’s o.k. to fight sometimes, but if the person loves you, he or she will want to be around you.

It doesn’t matter if your ex is saintly or the devil incarnate: you’ve got to learn how to navigate divorce the classy way. Not for his sake but for everyone’s sake, especially yours and your kids. If you’re divorcing with children, you won’t be free of this guy, ever. No one wants an ugly divorce, but it does happen sometimes. This doesn’t mean, however, that you’ve got to bare your claws or let the drama hang out for everyone to witness as you cope with divorce and the divorce process. You can navigate any divorce with class and keep your composure when your ex is around. Save the meltdowns for when you’re with loved ones that don’t include your kids. This isn’t to say that you can’t cry around your kids or be sad. That’s not realistic. You can’t be Pollyanna 24/7 while dealing with a divorce, but you can restrain the waterworks and drama, so your kids don’t feel burdened with your emotions. They’re your kids — not your therapists, plus remember that kids are dealing with their own unique emotions regarding the divorce, so don’t give them your emotions to handle. Ladies and mothers: fix your crown, straighten that posture, and take these tips on how to kill your ex with kindness in order to keep things cool and classy!

The two of you are there, in the middle of the most passionate and intimate act — sex — when your hideous and incorrect views of your body cause discomfort, displeasure, or sadness in the middle of the deed! Except here comes the worst part: you don’t even know that this is happening but your partner, who is the victim as well in your bad body image game, is aware. Painfully so. You may not even realize it, but your toxic feelings about your body are ruining the most precious and intimate aspect of your relationship. Here are four signs that your body image is negatively affecting your sex life.

1. You Experiment Less

Because you think your thighs, butt, or what have you are too big, too small, or not right, you experiment less in the bedroom. You’re uncomfortable in your skin and so you’re not ready to jump into a sexual relationship feeling confident and free. Instead, you’re feeling burdened and restrained.

When people hear I’m a single mom, a lot of stereotypes and myths come to mind. First off, some people would fight my single parent status: my ex and I are coparents and he is not what I call a “No-Show” or “Deadbeat Dad.” He is very present in my child’s life; however, to me, if you parent alone and without help, you are a single parent. By alone I mean no one ever comes home to relieve you. No one ever shows up to pay your bills, clean the home, care for the kid, and be an active part in you and your child’s daily routine. Instead, my ex and I “coparent.” To all the ladies and gents parenting alone with “No-Show” and “Deadbeat” parents, I commend you even more.

However, whether you’re a single mom because Dad skipped town, passed away, or you got a divorce, there are still many myths about single parents that need to go! They’re antiquated and untrue. In today’s day and age in which, according to the Pew Research Center, “Fewer than half (46%) of US kids younger than 18 years of age are living in a home with two married heterosexual parents in their first marriage,” the idea of what a family “looks” like has changed so drastically, whether it’s the gender of the parents raising the kids, the amount of parents in the home, the marital status of the two parents, and then some! The days of Leave It to Beaver are long gone. And so should some of these old tired single mom myths that I am sick of hearing.

I find some aspects of free-range parenting very admirable. In many ways, my childhood was a “free-range” childhood: I walked to school with a classmate, walked to stores alone as a teen, hit up my friends’ homes by walking alone within reason, and generally traveled in packs of kids rather than adult-led ways of traveling. Going to the park alone wouldn’t have been a big deal unless I was younger than a certain age. Typically, I played right on my block outside and didn’t go very far anyway.

I think my childhood is far more ideal than the current day and age in which kids rarely play with other kids after school, and if they on a rare occasion do, it’s orchestrated by adults, and rarely do kids get to walk to and from each other’s homes. I had fewer activities to do and less homework and generally had a good schoolwork-fun balance. It helped I was good at school.

But let’s face it: our lives aren’t really free-range anymore in that particular aspect. And while I monitor my parenting to be sure I am not hovering and have made an incredibly independent almost-5-year-old who does many things without help, I have to say: I don’t think I could completely free-range parent. Could I let my kid walk to the bus stop alone like I did? Sure. Could I let my kid walk down the street to see a friend? Yes. Could I let her walk and hang out in a park for hours, alone?

Over the holidays this years I watched as my news feed filled with “not-so great” news stories and updates of suicide upon suicide…upon suicide. Then someone I hadn’t seen in a while but who I think is a great person, attempted suicide unsuccessfully.

It floored me.

An astute friend of mine commented,”What’s with all the suicides?” and we noted that perhaps it was the holidays and our age. We are at the end of our thirties. Midlife crises are coming our way from now until age fifty.

Then, as a woman who is almost divorced, (I heard news we have 1 more paper to hand in and then we get our uncontested divorce date and it’s bam, done!) I wondered how often divorce plays a factor in suicide, and everything I have read has said that divorce increases suicide rates for parents (especially men, and children).

As we reach the end of our thirties, many of my friends, associates and acquaintances, are hitting many different milestones of life that can cause happiness or depression:

Births of children & family growth (or lack thereof)

Stable marriages or divorces

Buying & renovating homes (or losing them)

Career growths and raises (or starting new careers or losing a job

So what was it that was causing this string of suicides exactly, and is there any real answer?

The sugar and spice and everything nice dialogue has put women to the back of the bus for years.

When was the last time a man apologized for being too direct, too firm, or too certain? Never! Not even in Adam & Eve’s time did man bow down for being too assertive or aggressive.

Yet when we as women get a little assertive or aggressive suddenly, we’re black widow spiders and bitches.

There’s no room in our society for women to own the space they’re in without someone putting in his or her two cents about how awful that woman is. Me? I make no apologies for when I’m a bitch. Why should I apologize for being assertive and telling people the truth?

Am I supposed to live my life on the sidelines, smiling sweetly while others walk all over me? Or not reach for my career goals and rather wait for them to happen for me magically with a spoon full of sugar?

I’m not saying I’m a jerk or rude but that I tell people how I feel and participate in every activity or job I do 100 percent. I don’t care if I’m the youngest, least experienced, only female, or the newest somewhere — if I have something to add to the conversation, I will add it.